1943's Best Movies: 80 Years Later

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Rankings come from the overall list of the top 1,000 films at They Shoot Pictures, Don't They.

Poll Results

OptionVotes
MESHES OF THE AFTERNOON (Maya Deren & Alexander Hammid, USA) [#99] 6
THE SEVENTH VICTIM (Mark Robson, USA) [#1236] 5
DAY OF WRATH (Carl Theodor Dreyer, Denmark) [#275] 4
I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE (Jacques Tourneur, USA) [#581] 3
LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL BLIMP, THE (Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, UK) [#207] 3
SHADOW OF A DOUBT (Alfred Hitchcock, USA) [#565] 2
RED HOT RIDING HOOD (Tex Avery, USA) [#3552] 1
LUMIÈRE D'ÉTÉ (Jean Grémillon, France) [#2875] 1
THE OX-BOW INCIDENT (William Wellman, USA) [#1964] 0
OSSESSIONE (Luchino Visconti, Italy) [#733] 0
MILLIONS LIKE US (Frank Launder & Sidney Gilliat, UK) [#3470] 0
STORMY WEATHER (Andrew L. Stone, USA) [#5256] 0
QIU HAITANG (Ma-Xu Weibang, China) [#4990] 0
LES ANGES DU PÉCHÉ (Robert Bresson, France) [#2024] 0
LE CAPITAINE Fracasse (Abel Gance, France) [#3530] 0
LE CORBEAU (Henri-Georges Clouzot, France) [#1784] 0
Douce (Claude Autant-Lara, France) [#2318] 0
FIRES WERE STARTED (Humphrey Jennings, UK) [#1304] 0
FIVE GRAVES TO CAIRO (Billy Wilder, USA) [#3547] 0
FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS (Sam Wood, USA) [#4541] 0
GANG'S ALL HERE, THE (Busby Berkeley, USA) [#4212] 0
GOUPI MAINS ROUGES (Jacques Becker, France) [#5184] 0
HANGMEN ALSO DIE (Fritz Lang, USA) [#2392] 0
HEAVEN CAN WAIT (Ernst Lubitsch, USA) [#1120] 0
THIS LAND IS MINE (Jean Renoir, USA) [#2952] 0


fair but so uncool beliefs here (Eric H.), Friday, 18 August 2023 15:12 (one year ago)

Unlike with previous polls -- where I've gone with the contenders in the top 2,000 films -- I ended up going with the 25 highest-ranking 1945 titles to fill the options out.

fair but so uncool beliefs here (Eric H.), Friday, 18 August 2023 15:13 (one year ago)

I suspect the Archers will steamroll, so let me vote for Day of Wrath.

the dreaded dependent claus (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 18 August 2023 15:16 (one year ago)

A really tough, and ludicrous, contest between The Seventh Victim vs. The Gang's All Here for me

fair but so uncool beliefs here (Eric H.), Friday, 18 August 2023 15:17 (one year ago)

MESHES for sure

k3vin k., Friday, 18 August 2023 17:05 (one year ago)

Voted Day of Wrath - so few Dreyer films, when one comes up you gotta vote for it.

Have never seen a Grémillon, but like this anecdote from Pedro Costa:

“One day, Jean-Marie Straub told me a moral tale, the story of Jean Grémillon. He told me of how tall a man he was, how serious a filmmaker he was, the finest craftsmen French cinema has ever known. He told of how this true communist was broken and prevented from making films by the ever-rotting industry, because Grémillon was interested in fragile human beings and desires and class struggles. Jean-Marie, twenty years old, just arrived in Paris, was in the queue for L'amour d'une femme, Grémillon‘s last feature. On another line, fewer people were queuing for the American The Robe. The owner of the theater went by the Grémillon crowd whispering: ’Step on over to The Robe, don‘t go see this, it‘s a movie by a drunkard!’ I urge you to go watch all the films by Jean Grémillon!“

Ward Fowler, Friday, 18 August 2023 17:11 (one year ago)

I'll give Day of Wrath a fresh look sooner or later ... right now it's behind Gertrud, Jeanne, Ordet and Vampyr.

fair but so uncool beliefs here (Eric H.), Friday, 18 August 2023 17:15 (one year ago)

I watched most of the films in that Grémillon set released by Eclipse: they're okay at best.

the dreaded dependent claus (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 18 August 2023 17:18 (one year ago)

I'd upgrade LUMIÈRE D'ÉTÉ from "okay" to "interesting." But for me the real battle is between I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE and THE SEVENTH VICTIM.

Infanta Terrible (j.lu), Friday, 18 August 2023 17:30 (one year ago)

Shadow of a Doubt, followed by Zombie. Haven't seen Meshes, Day of Wrath, or The Seventh Victim.

clemenza, Friday, 18 August 2023 17:32 (one year ago)

The two Lewtons are tough to beat. Le Corbeau has almost as bleak a worldview.

Daniel_Rf, Friday, 18 August 2023 18:02 (one year ago)

Couldn't decide between a few of these so went for I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE as it's the only movie here with a Roky Erickson song named after it (I think)

there's no such thing as a winnable volume war (Matt #2), Friday, 18 August 2023 18:47 (one year ago)

Of the six I've seen, Meshes of the Afternoon over Shadow of a Doubt. Day of Wrath is vague in my memory, Ossessione even more so.
I've meant to see the Bresson for a long time, and Robin Wood wrote an interesting article about the Tourneur film that made me feel I should catch up with it.

Halfway there but for you, Monday, 21 August 2023 02:38 (one year ago)

It won't win, but everyone owes it to themselves to see The Gang's All Here for some prime Busby Berkeley/Carmen Miranda non-acid, acid hallucinations

Elvis Telecom, Monday, 21 August 2023 05:55 (one year ago)

two weeks pass...

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

System, Thursday, 7 September 2023 00:01 (one year ago)

Halfway think I should've just had I Walked with a Zombie and The Seventh Victim as a single joint option

fair but so uncool beliefs here (Eric H.), Thursday, 7 September 2023 13:35 (one year ago)

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

System, Friday, 8 September 2023 00:01 (one year ago)

Meshes of the Afternoon is a good choice

Dan S, Friday, 8 September 2023 00:05 (one year ago)

Happy to see The Seventh Victim a strong runner up

fair but so uncool beliefs here (Eric H.), Sunday, 10 September 2023 19:59 (one year ago)


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